THE

NEW-ENGLAND MEDICAL GAZETTE.

No. 2.

FEBRUARY, 1892.

VOL. XXVII.

Contributions of original articles, correspondence, personal items, etc., should be sent to the publishers,

Boston, Mass.

EDITORIAL.

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LAST WORDS ON THE INDIAN "AGE OF CONSENT" BILL. Certain of our friends in "farthest India" seem to think that we have not presented, altogether fully and fairly, the Hindu side of that very great question, the "Age of Consent" bill. In consequence of which we have received, via the GAZETTE'S very faithful friend and correspondent, Dr. D. N. Banerjee, of Calcutta, a full copy of the long and interesting memorial presented by a Hindu committee, appointed at a great public meeting called to protest against the measure then under consideration by the English government. This document - which space forbids us to reproduce in detail is amazingly interesting from every possible point of view. It is overflowing with race, with Orientalism; to read the lines and between the lines is to enter into the very atmosphere of a civilization so foreign to our own that we are bewildered out of the belief that this is the wide-awake, the nineteenth century, and that enlightenment everywhere is making advance, and progress is everywhere holding sway. As a bit of special pleading, it is very skilful, subtle and curious; as an absolutely naif revelation of points of view and motives of action which (in modified form indeed) obtain in other parts of the world as surely as, existing, they are denied and concealed, it is of unique and lasting interest. Indeed, perhaps its most interesting aspect, after all, is not the points of incredible difference it presents between Orientalism and Occidentalism, but the points of resemblance it presents;

VOL. XXVII-No. 2.

49

points which, looked squarely in the face, whisper an ironical question as to how far there survives, in our boasted perfection of civilization, the taint of frank, world-old barbarism.

We regret, in attempting to consider the matter, that neither this memorial, nor the "Terrible Memorial" of the medical women of India, published in our issue of August last, bears a date. It is therefore impossible to know whether the medical women's memorial had been made public at the time the one now under consideration was issued. In any case, the memorial of the medical women - brief, bitter and conclusive does away with the statement contained in the Hindu memorial, that cases of rape upon child-wives are practically unknown. The signed testimony of many Hindu physicians is here offered, to the effect that not one of them in his practice has ever seen such a case. In face of the fourteen cases cited in the women's memorial, this testimony, so far as weight is concerned, suggests the Western lawyer's argument that his client could not possibly have committed the murder; for whereas the state attorney could produce but three witnesses who had seen his client fire the shot, he could produce twenty witnesses who had

not!

Summarized, the Hindu argument against the "Age of Consent" Bill, runs as follows: It is directly contrary to the commands of the Hindu religion, which enjoins the marriage of all girls before the age of puberty, and the consummation of the marriage within four days after the appearance of the first menses. As the menses frequently appear before the age of twelve, which is that named in the bill-religion and law here come into sharp opposition. This is the whole matter, stated in a sentence; but a score or more of pages are devoted to ingeniously setting forth the beauties of the old régime, the impossibilities of any serious abuses under it, the perils and sorrows that must follow any changes in it. Curiously and interestingly enough, every argument brought forward by the defence, promptly, to Saxon interpretation, arrays itself on the side of the plaintiff. Take, for example, this delightfully candid paragraph:

"The result will be disastrous to the Hindu society inasmuch

as the girls having arrived at their maturity, will not submit to their parents in the choice of their husbands, and thus the Hindus will have to give up their zenanas, castes, etc., and introduce courtship and other customs of the West, to meet the new requirements of their society. Then, again, once the father is absolved from the sacred and onerous duty of marrying his daughter and allowed to be lax and careless, the girls of the country will be deprived of the disinterested, devoted and intelligent services of their best friends in the world, so absolutely necessary for their welfare in the peculiar circumstances of the country, and will thus have to shift for themselves to find a home and husband. It will thus be evident that the different parts of the Hindu social fabric are so delicately related to one another, that any slight violence to one is sure to destroy the whole fabric."

To the Saxon apprehension this possibility, which seems to the Hindu mind so calamitous, presents itself as a consummation devotedly to be wished: namely, that the women, the mothers of the race, should arrive at maturity free to think for themselves, choose for themselves, act for themselves. And yet, we must in honesty ask-how much of just this spirit survives in the claim, not unknown in emancipated America, that there are safer and more competent judges of woman's sphere than woman herself?

There is something as subtly ingenious as there is essentially revolting, in the following bit of argument:

"Your memorialists further beg to point out the material difference between rape and premature cohabitation by the husband. In the offence of rape, there are two elements, of which undoubtedly the graver one consists in outrage and insult to the feelings of the ravished party, and those of her dear and near relations as well as of the society at large; the other consisting in the physical injury inflicted on the subject of the offence.

That the severity of the punishment for rape, namely, ten years' rigorous imprisonment or transportation for life, is provided for mainly on account of the moral rather than the physical injury, is evidenced by the fact that severe punishments are inflicted even in cases of rape, but it is where the offence of

hurt is altogether absent. In the case of premature cohabitation by the husband with his wife, the graver element of insult and outrage to the feelings is absolutely wanting. It is only the minor element; namely, the physical injury of which he may be guilty. Your memorialists submit that, the Penal Code, as pointed out above, provides for the punishment of all palpable shapes of physical injury that a husband might inflict upon his immature wife.

It has been said that the Penal Code, as it stands, ignores the distinction between the two classes of cases by making a husband guilty of rape by reason of intercourse with a girl-wife below ten years of age. As regards this, your memorialists submit, that though there might be some excuse for this extraordinary departure from the recognized principle of legislation considering the extreme character of the case, the framers of the Code introduced the provision evidently with great hesitation, as is seen from the fact that, in the original draft of the Code, it was distinctly laid down that "sexual intercourse by a man with his own wife is in no case rape."

Terrible enough, this, in view of all one reads between the lines; but has our society risen sufficiently far above the standpoint on which such argument rests, to judge it very severely? How generally is it recognized and acted upon that a husband is more culpable and more despicable in using means of coercion, whether physical or mental, upon the wife whom he has sworn to honor, and whom the law gives almost unreservedly to his mercy, than upon a stranger whom the law protects from him? Until our civilization reaches this point in its upward growth, let us judge others but sparingly.

The memorial is, throughout, a curious confusion of manifest self-contradictions. It protests that the shameful crime which the new legislation aims to suppress, is practically non-existent ; and yet it claims that the law, enforced, would cause widespread hardship and misery. It claims that laws already exist to punish that crime; and admits that appeal is so rarely made to these laws that they are practically dead letters. It claims that with the first appearance of the menses a girl is fitted for wifehood and motherhood; a statement which would be indig

nantly denied by enlightened and unprejudiced medical science the world over.

If evidence were wanting that the "Age of Consent" Bill and all other forms of possible and practicable legislation looking toward the emancipation and protection of the enslaved women of India, are bitterly needed, such evidence would be furnished by the memorial before us. For the light it throws upon Hindu domestic ideas and customs, we shall all follow with intense interest, with more living and intelligent sympathy, the efforts of Saxon civilization to bring freedom and purity to the women of India. An earnestly-cherished religion should not be lightly meddled with; but when religion lends itself as a cloak, to cover awful cruelties to the hidden and helpless, no true man may hesitate as to how far it can command respect. Until our Hindu friends can authoritatively deny the facts set forth in the "Terrible Memorial," the Age of Consent Bill, in India, will have the rejoicing support of every Saxon mind and heart.

EDITORIAL NOTES AND COMMENTS.

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KEEPING IN STEP WITH NATURE

more and more we realize that this is the secret of bringing the sick to health, as we earlier recognized it to be the secret of keeping the healthy healthy. Time was when there was uncommonly little recognition paid to nature, still less consultation with her, on the part either of theology or of medicine. The former pronounced human nature to be deceitful and desperately wicked, until made over into something quite unrecognizable, by some patent theological process or other. The latter tacitly declared that nature was altogether powerless to make repairs in the organisms it is her business to keep in order, and proceeded to outrage, defy and overthrow her by every diabolic device known to ancient medical ingenuity. But modern theology has decided that work along the lines of unalterably established human needs and impulses is the only effective work; and modern medicine is learning, in wholesome humility, to stand with bared head before Mother